Willa Faye Hall, age 10, of Cleveland, 0H, for her question:

Where is Yosemite Valley's

Yosemite Valley is one of the wonders of Yosemite National Park. The Park is in the Sierra Nevada mountains of California. It is in the northern part of the state, some 200 miles east of San Francisco,

The valley is a deep, U shaped gorge with sheer cliffs and crowning turrets. The Merced River wanders through green meadows along the valley floor, High waterfalls spill over the towering cliffs to join the gentle river below,

Yosemite Valley is a gift to us from the Ice Ages. The Merced river was running down the western side of the Sierras when the glaciers crept southward, Down they pressed and carved the river valley into a deep gorge, This left the river's tributaries on the high ground way above the valley floor. They spill over the sheer cliff in frothy waterfalls to join the parent river in the valley.